read write prompt #53

by Nathan Moore

In honor of Read Write Poem’s first birthday, for our collaborative prompt this week we’ll go back to the first ever Read Write Poem prompt, which was, in fact, collaborative.

Here’s how Dana started that prompt:

Welcome to the first-ever Read Write Prompt. This week, we’ll focus on American Sentences. Some people don’t like the name, but please don’t be put off by it. It’s simply the name Allen Ginsberg chose for this poetry form, which is a single sentence of 17 syllables. You can read more about American Sentences at www.americansentences.com, where Paul Nelson talks about them in detail.

For this exercise, we’ll write an American Sentence. The original prompt suggested collaboration by finding someone on the participant page, emailing them and working together to write sentences back and forth in response to one another or writing a sentence word by word together.

For this post, we’ll see how American Sentences might be combined to form a single poem, with different people each contributing a sentence to the overall poem. If you would like, leave one American Sentence in the comments section of this post. When we post the Get Your Poem On post, we’ll include our group poem at the bottom of that post on Thursday. You can read the result of the original experiment here.

We’re asking everyone to leave an American Sentence in the comments section of this post. Comments will be open until midnight Tuesday (CST).

When it’s time to Get Your Poem On, we’ll have a free day of sorts: You’ll be invited to link to anything you like. If you’ve written a series of American Sentences, you can link to that. Or feel free to link to something in response to one of our other prompts or another poem you’d like us to read. Whatever you want to do. We’re easy that way. And, happy anniversary again. This is a celebration of all you’ve done in the last year and all you’ve made Read Write Poem.

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32 comments to (collaborative) read write prompt #53: birthday collaboration!

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read write poem news

  • read write poem napowrimo anthology
    June 20, 2010 | 1:36 pm

    The Read Write Poem NaPoWriMo Anthology is still in production. Selection, placement, layout and copyediting are taking longer than anticipated. Thank you for your patience. I hope to have the piece completed in July. For those who have emailed asking if they can be included, the May 7 deadline for submission of work stands. Those who met that deadline will be included. Please check the post on this site listing who I received submissions from by that date. If you submitted your work by the May 7 deadline in accordance with our guidelines and your name is not listed, send an email to info (at) readwritepoem (dot) org.

  • read write poem napowrimo anthology
    May 5, 2010 | 3:09 pm

    Remember that Friday* is the deadline for submitting work to the Read Write Poem NaPoWriMo Anthology. Check out the guidelines for submission in the main column (to the left). On May 8, we’ll post a news item listing everyone we’ve received work from. If you submitted work and your name is not on that list, please let us know. Thanks!

    *I initially said “tomorrow,” but I meant to say “Friday.”

  • napowrimo congratulations, and a reminder
    April 24, 2010 | 12:05 pm

    It’s the final week of the Read Write Poem NaPoWriMo Challenge! Just 7 days left. With that, a reminder that Read Write Poem will culminate with the anthology featuring work from those who complete the challenge. A post with details for submitting to the anthology will be published May 1. Be sure you remove any information from the site that you want preserved — such as group content and personal messages. Those elements of the site will be removed May 1 as well. The main site will remain up as an archive.

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    April 20, 2010 | 8:11 pm

    January Gill O’Neil’s virtual book tour has moved to her site and is underway now. Check out the lineup at Poet Mom.

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